Internet filtering is on the rise first it was China then the Gulf now it's Australia. It seems the days of free internet are coming to an end in Australia. The Australian government has announced that it will be broadly censoring the internet and establishing an IT infrastructure -ALA Chinese methods- to ban certain sites from being viewed in the country. To be censored by the Australian Government is "pornography and inappropriate material." X rated pornography is illegal online in Australia, as are casino style internet gambling, certain forms of "hate" speech and R rated computer games. BitTorrent would be a possibility, even if certain downloads for personal use may be legal under Australian law, sharing those downloads would not be.

Federal Labor will improve existing government programs in this area by:
• Providing a mandatory 'clean feed' internet service for all homes, schools and public computers that are used by Australian children, so that ISPs will filter out content identified as prohibited by the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA). The ACMA 'blacklist' will also be made more comprehensive to ensure that children are protected from harmful and inappropriate online material;
• Providing children with age-appropriate online cyber-safety resources and making sure teachers are skilled in cyber-safety;
• Establishing a Youth Advisory Group (YAG) to ensure that the Government is kept up-to-date with issues that affect children online;
• Undertaking further research into cyber-safety issues in Australia to determine where best to target future policy and funding in this area; and
• Establishing a permanent Joint Parliamentary Standing Committee to investigate and report on cyber-safety in Australia. A Rudd Labor Government will transform cyber-safety in Australia by providing Australian children, teachers and parents with a first-class cyber-safety education and by providing new forums in which cyber-safety issues will be raised and addressed.